When it comes down to it, racism still plays a huge part in the United States till this day. Although some may argue that it “may not be a big deal and it isn’t as bad. ” Either way their are still flashes of racism going on that needs to come to an abrupt end. One main example of racism that I see in society today is stereotyping. Stereotyping comes from what people here and see on tv, or what the news is showing them abour a certain race or ethnicity. African Americans seem to be the ones who get hit the hardest when it comes to stereotyping.
Some examples of African American stereotypes is that they are all angsters and killers and they all portray traits of violence. As well with being violent, they are also tricked into thinking that they are all ghetto, and disobey the law. Reasoning behind all the stereotypes is the media and how they downgrade African Americans, and manipulate society into this way of thinking. Media portrayal has been an issues since news media was allowed to be aired nationwide. In 1968 the FCC put out a rule to display more diverse programming in the media.
This may have taken effect due to the low participation from minorities in the media production. In 1997, only 20% of minorities made up the broadcasting workforce. Along with news broadcasting, their is a trend of stereotypes in movies and tv shows that play a big role on how and why people make assumptions of the African American community. The media portrays African Americans in mostly a negative manner, and the result of that leads to stereotyping in those surrounding them.
Increasing their knowledge on the positive instead of the negative is what is needed to turn things around to make the United States a more equal domain for all races. The media plays a role in how people iew other people, and can ultimately sway your decisions on how you view different races, cultures, and religions. When you are being fed the same things everyday, you tend to get use to the thing you are being fed. In other words, if the media puts the same thing out everyday ten times a day, eventually you are going to be tricked into believing it.
Like in North Korea how Kim Jung Un tells all of his people how bad the United States is, eventually they all ended up believing him. And in a way the media plays a role of a dictatorship, with less of a forceful nature. As Ed Helen explains in the second volume of Media Portrayals of African Americans “Hidden audience research, news consultant firms, and the Warner Class Model has influenced the way the media began to portray the news amongst different social classes. ” A great example of this is the story about young man named Terrell Pough.
He was an African American man who was idolized in the media due to his ambitious characteristics. He was also honored at a 76ers game. He was later murdered for failure to pay a drug debt. The media quickly changed their perception of him as soon as they heard f the accusation of his drug debt. Once an idolized person, he was easily changed instantly into a crook and a convict in all the news reports. Immediately turning him into just another statistic as a murdered African American.
He was a charismatic man, and once the media had changed their view on him, so did the rest of society. Maybe if their was other news rather than stereotypical news always being portrayed, than maybe the media can change the perceptions of African Americans overtime into something more positive. The American people are being bolstered by the media of stereotypes and isperceptions of African Americans through different images, and videos being rendered through local newscasters.
When people see a certain culture as violent due to what was shown on tv, then they will often look to genocide that certain group of people. Kristen states that the media is “Used to broadly frame bigotry and racism as something so entrenched that some people aren’t aware that they subconsciously harbor racist feelings, associating black skin with negative behavior. Put simply, their “conditioning has been conditioned, and marginalized groups are often left to pick up the pieces in the ake of brutality and/or neglect by those in positions of power, trust and influence. An example of this would be like during the Trayvon Martin case when Trayvon was mistakenly taken as a suspicious person in his own neighborhood. From 2004-2012 George Zimmerman had made over 50 calls to the police department. So we can infer that due to Trayvon Martin’s skin color and casual attire that he was stereotyped as a thief and or roobber. And these accusations were caused by prior perceptions in the media along with years of experience. This is morally incorrect and also unjust to jump to conclusions about a ertain person due to their skin color.
Time is devoted for research to understand how media is an extremely powerful institution, influencing people’s social perceptions, attitudes, beliefs, behaviors, and ultimately how they view themselves and others. Lots of research studies have found that mediated information can impact attitudes and beliefs of individuals who have had no direct contact with people of other ethnic and social groups, which leads to stereotypes. “Analyses of news content have shown that news media tend to present African Americans, particularly males, as perpetrators of crime, often howing them as violent.
Stories about African Americans are also more likely to be accompanied with prejudicial information that implies danger and threat. ” Media viewing, can basically lead to false perceptions of reality,especially when it comes to violence and its connection to African Americans. Explanations of why things work or happen the way they do suggest that media can be a powerful organization in activating and strengthening existing prejudiced mental pictures by presenting stimuli that can bring to mind related thoughts that affect the way new information is processed.
In other words, when one aspect of a prejudiced mental picture is presented, even if the rest of the representation is non stereotypic, that stereotypic element will activate other connected elements in the viewer and cause him or her to understand the presented individual through a stereotypic lens. Body Paragraph 4: Topic: Although there is a substantial amount of African Americans who commit crimes, and portray traits of violence, there are some African Americans who are intelligent and try to change the world as we know it.
Follow up: Rob is one of seven lack Americans in his class to graduate with a PhD in applied mathematics. He is also one of 23 African Americans who changed the mathematical pipelines Quote: “The stories of Black men who have traveled far down the road of mathematics can be particularly powerful because they can reflect on their experiences and provide retrospective, first-hand understandings of what it means to endure and persist. ” Explanation: Identifying different African Americans in the U. S that have had a positive impact is what is needed in the media.
This is a big deal for me because want to help get the media’s ind off of all the negative that is shown about African Americans, and reflect more on the positive. This will help give African Americans a better label, a more firm perception on the success that goes on in its culture. Body Paragraph 5: Topic: Along with the Rob story, another story that would be a good fit to help shape a new and improve perception on African Americans is the Ben Carson story. Follow Up: Ben Carson made an impact in the health industry as we know it, becoming a successful pediatric neurosurgeon and why people look up to him in the field of medicine.
He is honored by the African American media and is a leader and role model in today’s society. Explanation: Although this example may be considered as old, I still find much importance in it because I believe everyone should be exposed to his story. There is also a movie made about him called Gifted Hands. Rebuttal Paragraph: Don’t get me wrong, there are lots of African Americans that do commit crime and are current members of gangs. And if most of the stories during that day are related to crimes committed by African Americans than they should be programmed.
The numbers of minorities in the penitentiary are substantially higher than those of American descent, and most cases of news cover the negative that happens in the community. So it only makes sense to cover what is happening in the community. Rebuttal Paragraph Pt 2: But when covering these certain stories on the news, they tend to get the most negative image of African Americans that they can find. And although lots of stories that usually consists of African Americans are negative, maybe lowering the rate at which they are presented is what is needed.